Tech Giants Form Washington Lobbying Group

Google, Amazon.com
, eBay, Facebook and other Internet
companies have formed a lobbying group called The Internet
Association to tackle regulatory and political issues in
Washington, D.C., and it is due to kick off on Wednesday.

Google, Amazon.com
, eBay, Facebook and other Internet
companies have formed a lobbying group called The Internet
Association to tackle regulatory and political issues in
Washington, D.C., and it is due to kick off on Wednesday.

It will lobby on issues such as allocation of visas for
engineers and matters of privacy and piracy, said the group's
president Michael Beckerman, a former advisor to Fr ed Upton, th e
chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives' Energy and
Commerce Committee.

Other members include Expedia, LinkedIn,
Monster Worldwide, Yahoo! and Zynga.

Formation of the group marks a stronger alliance of Internet
companies as they try to influence regulations pertaining to
revenue repatriation, cyber security, and sales tax.

"It is the Internet's decentralized and open model that has
unleashed unprecedented entrepreneurialism," said Beckerman.
"Policymakers must understand that the preservation of that
freedom is essential to the vitality of the Internet itself and
the resulting economic prosperity."

Google and Facebook are among the companies that have been
steadily ramping up spending on lobbying the federal government.
Older tech companies, like Microsoft, have long been
active in Washington.

Google, which is being investigated by antitrust regulators
in the United States and Europe, has lobbied officials at the
Federal Trade Commission, the Federal Communications Commission
and the Department of Commerce, according to disclosure forms.

Facebook has lobbied regarding online privacy and immigration
reform while also talking to lawmakers and their staffs about
matters concerning initial public offerings.

In May, Facebook became the first U.S. company to go public
with a market valuation above $100 billion. Its market debut was
marred by technological problems on the NASDAQ exchange and
criticism that the IPO was priced too high.